Dub in Hibernation

The W650 put away while I recover from back surgery. It's starting to become a convenient place to pile stuff.

Garage Furniture

                                   Believe it or not, there is a W650 under the cover

We got 5 inches of snow a couple of days ago and as I looked out over the blanket of white it occurred to me that I wouldn't be riding a motorcycle even if I were in the best of health.  For a few minutes there I stopped feeling sorry for myself because I couldn't ride my motorcycles.

It has been four and a half months since I parked the bikes and not quite that long since I got them covered up.  After they were covered up they just seemed to become part of the usual garage clutter, and now I've taken to piling stuff on them.  The Dub has the empty house Christmas lights sitting on the covered up luggage rack and the other day I carefully laid the carpet floor mats from the Buick on the luggage rack of the REB.  I've got to resist the temptation to treat my babies like garage furniture.

Update:  see photo, it's too late, I've lost the battle.

An Update

  My doctor's appointment with the surgeon last Wednesday, the 3rd of december went well.  He asked how I was doing, I told him and he said, "that's good, it should continue to improve, see you in two months."  Maybe it was a little more involved than that but not much.

  At four months post-surgery I'm walking without my cane at times.  I've actually ventured out without it several times in the last week.  This morning I walked all the way around the block sans cane.  Not without pain mind you but I made it none the less. 

  The problem now is the muscles in the back getting tight, especially in the cold.  The foot is much better but still hurts, etc.

  I could probably ride a motorcycle if I really wanted to.  It's too cold though and I'll hold off until Spring as I planned. 

  Got to get a grip on myself and lose some weight.  Water therapy and PT isn't getting it done.  I will probably have to kiss the nightly bowl of ice cream good bye.

  Got to get to work on the Christmas letter, running late as usual and it's slipping up on me.  Looking forward to seeing all the kids and Alexander home for Christmas.

Good Things About Surgery

My foot has really improved during the last week.  Maybe I'm having a healing spurt, but shhhh, let's keep that a secret for a little longer.  Obvisouly not being able to do stuff has its advantages.  My brother-in-law and his wife have just arrived to clean out my gutters.

Thank God for good in-laws, don't know what I'd do without mine.  OK, I'm ready for winter, now where did I put that snow shovel?

The Foot

Showing slight improvement over the last couple of weeks.  Still hurts, stings, burns, etc.  I've been told (not by a doctor) that such pain is a sign that the nerves are healing.  I take that back a doctor did tell me that........my dentist.

I often park the cane in the corner if I'm in close quarters and need to get up and down, a restaurant or church pot luck for example.

Busy day today,  pool therapy this morning at the YMCA, lunch with friends and dinner with friends. 

 I forgot to mention that my wife is in Virginia.  She went for our grandson's 3rd birthday.  He is pretty spoiled.  Our Georgia daughter and her husband were there for the weekend.  Daughter #1 and I feel left out, of course I could have went but chose to stay home.

Historic Day

On this historic day in which an African/American was elected President of the USA I felt compelled to make a blog entry. 

There you are, I hope you weren't looking for any astute political commentary.  This blog is about me.  Me and my damned foot, lately, as it turns out.  Dare I say it?  I think the foot is getting a little better.  We shall see.

 

My Season is Over

Officially ended my motorcycle riding season the other day when my brother-in-law moved the REB so I could get to the bike covers.  He then covered the bikes while I stood and stoopervised.  This is the first time I have covered them up, always having them ready to ride the instant a decent day occurred.  I'll patiently wait until Spring before I think about riding again. 

I recently befriended A young Wichita U. student, via the Royal Enfield Forum, that is having electrical problems with his new Military.  He is blowing headlights so I sent him a couple of 5 inchers that I had lying around.  Hope he figures out the problem as he is unable to find any locally.  He has an interesting web site, http://www.indianajosh.com/, and is well traveled for such a young guy.

Something Positive

Finally something positive to report almost 10 weeks after surgery.  On September 29th my surgeon put me on the drug Lycrica to help with the nerve pain in my right leg and foot.  Yawnnnn, no effect.  Last Monday I met with my local doctor and she tells me to double the dosage.  The next day the nerve pain in my leg and foot is noticeable reduced, hallelujah!  I feel SO much better I can't believe it.  Oh, I still have that pain in the ball of my foot that hurts like hell when I walk but I had an MRI for that yesterday so am hoping to find a cyst or some reason for the pain.  My back is doing fine.

Appointment With Surgeon

Last Wednesday Sue drove me to Wichita for an X-ray and an appointment with the surgeon.  Long story short, the surgeon was much more pleased than I was.  The surgeon says "you know it's only been eight weeks"  I said "It's been eight weeks already".  He thinks the pain in my foot will eventually go away but it might not so we will cross that bridge when we get there.  OK doc, I'll suck it up and get with the physical therapy.  Here is my X-ray for your enjoyment $109,000 worth.  I don't think I'll have to pay anything.  Medicare and Tricare for Life will pick up the tab (I hope). 

After Seven Weeks

My friend Richard stopped by to visit last night.  We chatted for a while and he reminded me that he hadn't seen anything new in my blog.  I confessed that I had been sitting around feeling sorry for myself.

Only I could have back surgery and end up with foot pain, serious foot pain.  There is a nerve running down there I guess cause I had pain in my leg and foot before surgery and had hoped I would get relief from that.  No such luck so far, my regular doctor has had me take a CAT scan, some kind of doppler test and an x-ray.  The latest, the x-ray, is looking for a stress fracture in my foot.  I wish they would find one, at least it would be fixable.  If it is nerve pain I'm just screwed. 

The x-ray was on Monday and here it is Friday and nothing said about it.  Oh, I've called the doctor's office a couple of times and just got the standard bs.  I'm for sure supposed to find out as soon as the doctor get do with her current appointment, that was an hour ago.

I see my surgeon on Monday, I don't expect much from him except that the back is doing OK now go away.

My right foot feels like a rock, can't move my toes, can't feel much.  I don't know if I could drive or not, damn foot couldn't feel anything.  The bike would probably be easier to ride than driving the car.  At least I could brake with my hand, maybe I'll look into a scooter...........

Rally on the River 2007

One Month

It was one month Saturday that I had my back operation.  I honestly thought I'd be getting along pretty well by now.  I never thought that I'd still be using a walker to get around.  So much for my plans.  Here I am still gimping around with the walker.  Today was the first time I have gone any place other than the doctor's or PT.  It was nice to be around people at Sunday School, but I was too worn out to stay for church.  

Today was a pot luck too, dang I hate missing those pot luck dinners.  If you don't go to church you won't understand what you are missing.

I have made some progress though, the pain is less and I'm using fewer pain pills.  I still can't sleep at night (it's past midnight as I write this).  I'm able to dress my self for the most part.  Not to be gross or anything but I've been wiping my own butt for a couple of weeks.  My wife, God love her, has been an angel.  Don't ever try something like this unless you have been married at least 35 years.  Any less and your spouse probably couldn't stand it.

People have been real nice to visit and bring me stuff.  My friend Neil finally got by and he brought me a box of old motorcycle mags to look at.  I was flipping through a 1969 issue of CYCLE when a name caught my eye.  It was a letter to the editor from my mother-in-law about how they used their cycles on the farm to check the cattle.  It wasn't long afterward that her son, my brother-in-law, stopped by unexpectedly along with his son and his family.  They all enjoyed reading that long forgotten phase of their parents and grandparents.

Enough of this nonsense.  Here is a photo of myself and my always present walker and brace.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Three Weeks Post-op

  I won't bore with endless details of a hospital stay.  After four days in the hospital they kicked me out and I went home.  The first couple of days at home weren't too bad, I didn't have a lot of pain and could get around with the walker fairly well.  Something happened about the third day home and things have gone to crap since.  I have swelling in my right foot, constant pain down my leg and in my back.  The pain pills only seem to work about an hour but I can't only have one ever four.  My wife watches the medication for me, I call her the pill Nazi.  My doctor says my sacroiliac is off, one hip is higher than the other, that would account for the additional pain.

  At over three weeks post-op things haven't gotten much better and I seem to sleep all day and stay awake all night.  I've started physical therapy so maybe that will give me some relief.

  Motorcycles?  Honestly haven't given them much thought.  I'm getting a bad attitude.

Back Surgery and Biking

Back surgery and biking don't seem to go together too well.  I'm sure it is done all the time but I have never read an article about it in CYCLE WORLD or RIDING SOUTH MAGAZINE, so in the next few weeks/months, however long it takes I plan to blog it here.

Never mind how I got to the point of needing back surgery.  It was a years long decline that had recently started to have an impact on my riding activities, time to go under the knife or laser, what ever they use.

After about an hour of pre-op time where you get issued your tie in the back gown, asked the same questions over and over again by different people and get stuck several times for I.Vs. and thing like that I am getting rolled into the operating room.  It's 10:45am and I remember seeing my surgeon washing his hands and smiling.  My next conscious memory was being in the middle of an ER like tv show at 5:45pm.  Nurses are running around, people are still sticking me with IVs, taking my blood pressure.  My wife has her brave front smile on as I hear someone say, He's lost a lot of blood and the pressure is 65/37, I sure wish the doctor would come in but he says were doing the right things.  I'm thinking that doesn't sound too good but know what?  I don't give a hoot and I go back to sleep.

I wake up a few hours later and little more aware of my surroundings.  I have it all, oxygen tube, IVs all over the place, blood pressure cuff cutting my arm off every few minutes, a catheter, some kind of drainage catching ball running out of my back.  I can't move and my mouth feels like the bottom of an ash tray. 

End of day one, Aug 6, 2004.  I'll add to this as I feel like it.

Hanging it Up

Just temporarily, until I heal up from back surgery.  I have long suffered from a back condition known as spondylolisthesis and in the last couple of years there has been additional stenosis and the latest MRI shows a ruptured disk.  The plan is to fuse four vertebrae, L2-S1, and clean up the stenosis and rupture.  This is all supposed to give me some relief.  I'm just praying that it doesn't get any worse.

No, riding doesn't make it worse.  I don't hurt any more

from riding that I do from driving, walking is what tears me up.  Here is a good x-ray of what the apparatus looks like.  I joke that I get a discount if I pick up some stainless screws at True Value on my way to the hospital  

Madison, KS 7-30-08

I wasn't looking forward to the 135 mile to Madison because I just knew it was going to be hot.  Mother Nature sure threw us a curve ball last Wednesday as it was cool and overcast all day.  It didn't start warming up until I was almost home and the cloud cover disappeared.

Madison is a nice little South East Kansas down halfway between Opie and Hamilton just off on state hwy 99.  The cafe had recently opened up and was glad for the business the 32 motorcycles brought in.  Nothing unique in the menu but the service was excellent and the food good small town fare.

An old friend from my school days in Galva showed up from Iola.  He recently returned to riding with his brand new Vulcan.  We had a nice visit and vowed to do it again as soon as I heal up from back surgery on Aug 6th.

These little guys were with a couple on an older Yahama sidecar rig.

Several of us stopped by the Council Grove Dairy Queen for the now obligatory ice cream before heading west to home.  I lead coming and going and didn't get us lost once

Didn't even have my GPS.

It was a good motorcycle day and my last one for a while.

 

Madison, KS 7-30-08

Update

To be honest I haven't felt like doing much riding since the Minnesota trip.  Oh, I rode to lunch in Yoder, KS with the ROMEOs last week on the Dub and have ridden to coffee a couple of times, but just haven't felt the need to ride.  Until this morning that is.  After messing with the computer and tech support trying to get an internet connection I realized about 8am that I hadn't had breakfast yet.  It just came to me in a flash...........ride the REB to Marquette for breakfast.  So I did. 

I had taken off the exhaust system to repair the broken mounting brackets and replace it with the old stock set up with the modified stock muffler and was wanting to try it out anyway.  It seemed to work fine with the exception of one backfire.  It is a little more restrictive but I don't plan to re-jet unless it gets to running funny.

On the way back I met the ROMEOs as they were heading to lunch.  I bet they wondered what my story was.  We have all the daughters coming home tomorrow so I thought I spend today getting some things done around the house. 

Breakfast was excellent, the REB is still running great, life is good.

Kansas Motorcycle Museum Home Page

http://www.ksmotorcyclemuseum.org/

Kansas Motorcycle Museum

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Other

Yoder, KS 7-2-08

Photos by Pat Doherty, Richard Kurtz and Bob Serpan. ROMEO lunch at the Carriage Crossing restaurant, an Amish establishment in Yoder. Extensive pie menu.

Dick Mann and Alexander

REunion 2008

This is roughly the round trip route we took going to the Royal Enfield reunion in Lanesboro, MN. 

Day One 6-19-08

  Richard, my riding buddy from Lindsborg, is right on time for our 7:30am departure.  I must admit that I'm a little nervous as this will be the longest ride I have attempted on the REB.  It's 700 miles to the rally site and that is a long ride on this bike.  Richard is on his Aprilla Scarabo scooter  so  if I break down at least I'll be able to ride pillion in comfort.

  The weather forecast is calling for scattered thunderstorms all the way to our first day destination of Ida Grove, IA.  We are going to meet an old motorcycle racing Navy buddy of mine that I haven't seen in nine years. 

  Riding north and keeping any eye on the sky it turns out to be a pleasant day.  The REB is loving the mid 70's temperature and we enter Nebraska with the rain gear still on the rack.  We can see rain all around us and during one stretch the road is wet enough to soak my jeans below the knees but our luck is holding out.

  George meets us at our motel before we get unpacked and it is like we just saw each other yesterday.  Except for being a couple of old farts we don'tseem to have changed much.  He gives a tour of his farm before dinner and as expected there are several dirt bikes and three street bikes living in the various out buildings.  George is one of these guys that can fix anything and build anything so he has lots of gadgets and toys to look at. 

Dinner was great and it was fun to visit with old friends.  Richard and George had their Iron Butt rides in common and the Concours that Richard's son has is the same model of the two George owns.

Day Two 6-20-08

  It looks like it is going to be a gorgeous day, no wind and hardly a cloud in the sky.  George decided to ride a few miles with us so it was good not to be in the lead for awhile.  I'm afraid my 55-60 speed is putting a crimp in his riding style but he graciously stays within the REB's comfort zone.

  Iowa looks like Kansas except there is corn instead of wheat.  We see an occasional wind farm, small towns, and cows.  The roads are N/S, E/W and in excellent condition.  We have an extra long lunch in Algona, IA because of the REB/scooter delay factor.  The driver of the Plymouth Prowler we parked next to was quite taken with our rides and wanted to talk about them. 

  We took a short break at the Minnesota visitor's center and except for a little detour and a ten mile run on Interstate 90 things went well as we neared Lanesboro.  The landscape went from flat farm land to hilly twisty roads in a big hurry as we got close and we could see that we were in for some nice riding tomorrow. 

The Eagle Cliff campground was picturesque and clean and we were soon putting our tents up with a little help from Chris Janes from Detroit.  I had met Chris at the Rally on the River last year in Missouri.  He owns an RE but rode his Harley to the REunion. 

Three Enfields, a Harley and a scooter rode into town for dinner.  People were quite taken with Richard's scoot and he probably spent more time telling people about it that the RE riders did explaining their machines.  The guys seemed to be interested in the REs and the ladies liked the scoot.  Richard thought he was the attraction but I'm pretty sure it was the scoot.

Day Three 6-21-08

Sleeping in a tent on the ground isn't all that bad but waking up without any coffee is pure torture.  CMW was cooking breakfast but they didn't get started too early and no one had thought to get the coffee ready for us early risers. 

After breakfast we started talking about going for a ride and by and by we hit the road.  About ten of us I think, including three Bullets, one REB sidecar outfit, Kevin on the CMW shop Electra, a 1956 Matchless, a scooter and CMW's Jim leading on his Honda ST1300.  There were some others but I can't remember.

At one point in the ride Richard and I decided to cut out and ride over the Mississippi into Wisconsin, just for the heck of it. We soon rejoined the group because they had been slowed down when Ron's 1999 Blue Deluxe broke down with an apparent piston failure.  During the ensuing scramble to get Ron's bike back to the camp Kevin's bike stopped running.  He said he was sure he could have gotten it running again if someone hadn't taken away all the tools.

The rest of us finished the ride and the two ailing bikes got a ride in the trailer.

CMW put out supper, fried chicken and all the trimmings.  They had door prizes for everyone and a couple of nice plaques, one for the Hard Luck Rider and one for the Long Distance Rider.  Ron got the hard luck trophy and the long distance award went to the Kansas guys.  Since Richard is 18 miles south of me I insisted he take the prize.  After all that (no speeches thank goodness) we sat around the old camp fire as the longest day of the year came to a close. 

I was waiting for someone to start singing Kumbaya when one of the Minnesota crew said let's make some long cakes.  Now that was about the funniest thing I had seen in some time.  They had these eight inch long one inch dowel rods fixed on a stick and rolled biscuit dough down over them all the while explaining how to do it.  The funny part was the instructions were the same as for rolling on a condom.  They stuck them in the fire and after they were done filled them with strawberries, blueberries and whipped cream, very tasty.  Of course the camera was in the tent.

Day Four 6-22-08

It rained last night so breaking camp was a messy affair but at least we had coffee. 

If I did much of this camping thing I'd have to refine my technique or get different equipment or something as it was almost ten before be rolled out of the campground heading south for Anamosa, IA to visit the National Motorcycle Museum.

Traveling these Iowa back roads without laying out a route first is an adventure.  I led because of the GPS.  I finally broke out the Iowa map George had given me and planned a route to Anamosa.  We rolled up to the Museum at 3:30 only to find out that it closed at 4.  Turned out not to be a problem as they told us to stay as long as we liked.  Nice display of bikes, not Barber standards but and interesting place. 

With several hours of daylight left we decided push on west before finding a place to spend the night.  Yeah, I saw the sign that said Road Closed to Through Traffic, yes I knew they had been having lots of flooding in Iowa but I figured there would be a good chance that we could ride around whatever the problem was.  I couldn't have been more wrong.  The picture on the left shows what stopped us dead after going around a couple of barriers.  As luck would have it there was a guy there taking pictures of the damage, and he was a biker.  He said he didn't know the roads but if we could follow him a few miles up the road his girlfriend could tell us how to get around the washed out highway.  Turns out it was the girlfriend's bike he was riding.  We pulled into the girlfriend's farm and she quickly showed us a route to get into Toledo, IA.  Very nice folks showing kindness to a couple of old coots on bikes.  Bikers still stick together......in Iowa anyway.

Day Five 6-23-08

We took every advantage of the Iowa back roads, riding two lanes so small there were no center stripes but with great curves and hills. In one little town the pavement abruptly ended and there was nothing but gravel in three directions.  Hawk Eye Kurtz spotted the tarmac a couple hundred yards further away while I frantically looked at the map and GPS.  Off we go just like on a ROMEO ride in Kansas.  We had lunch the ROMEO like cafe of WoJo's in the town of Humeston, IA.  A quick jag through NW Missouri and across the Missouri river into Nebraska was enough for my ailing back and we searched out a nice little motel in Beatrice, NE.

Day Six 6-24-08

Our luck ran out as we crossed the border into Kansas and the rains came down.  We were able to find a place to pull over and don the rain gear.  The rain stopped and I had lead us down a dead end road by the time we hit Linn, KS and it was time for coffee.  We knew it was a good place when we saw three Highway Patrolmen walking out.  Never a dull moment around Richard as he inquired of the officers as to the quality of the doughnuts.  They had a good sense of humor, fortunately, and visited with us while we pulled off our gear.

It occurred to me while took a break in Clay Center that we would get to Salina around noon so we called our wives and had them meet us of lunch.  I guess guilt finally overcame Richard because after lunch he insisted that I take the plaque he got for the long distance rider.  I thought it required a formal presentation so his wife, Joyce took this picture.

Wrap-up

The REB ran like a dream the whole trip, I lost the nut on the exhaust header bracket but George gave me a replacement for it.  I lost a bolt out of the GPS mount and Richard secured it with one of the rubber bands he keeps wrapped around the hand grip of the scoot.  I added 40 ozs of oil in 1579 miles and averaged about 62 mpg while running 55-60 mph.  Richard's scoot hit a few bugs and he had to clean them off, his gas mileage was about the same as mine and I remember him saying he should check his oil but I don't know if he ever did.  A few days later while cleaning the bike I discovered that the muffler bracket had broken, second one in less than a year.

It was a good ride, folks are friendly on the back roads and especially to old guys on strange looking motorbikes.

 

 

REunion 2008

Royal Enfield reunion in Lanesboro, MN. Sponsored by Classic Motor Works, the importer of Royal Enfield motorcycles.

REunion in Lanesboro, MN

  Tomorrow morning Richard and I start our ride to Lanesboro, MN for the annual Royal Enfield REunion put on my Classic Motor Works, the U.S. importer for Royal Enfields.  I will be on the REB, of course, and Richard is taking his Scarabeo.  The first leg will be 360 miles to Ida Grove, IA where we will visit with an old Navy buddy of mine. Another 285 on Friday will put us at the REunion site, Eagle's Cliff campground.

  The weather is looking iffy for tomorrow but the rest of the trip looks good right now.  Coming back we had hoped to visit the National Motorcycle Museum in Anamosa, IA but it's looking like flooding might make us change our plans, we'll see.

Douglass, KS 6-11-08

 

Marty, Neil, Jim and I mounted up promptly at 8:40 to fight the strong south wind for the 123 miles to Douglass, KS.  First stop was to join Richard and the Lindsborg crew but to our aghast no one was home.  It isn't like Richard to leave early, something must be up.  We battled the wind to Hesston where we pulled over for a breather.  No sooner had we stopped than Richard & Joyce on their scoot followed closely by Bill and Paul pulled into Casey's where we had stopped.  Richard's feet barely touched down and he was off again muttering something about getting to Braum's pick up T-Shirts.  Well that mystery is solved, he's picking up a batch of ROMEO T-shirts for the guys and doesn't want to be late meeting his contact.

Windblown, hot and hungry we find the restaurant, I never did find out the name of the place.  The sign just had an M on it.  Quite a menu for a small town place but as some of the ROMEOs found out a good portion wasn't available until supper.  No problem they had a special and sandwiches.  The young lady seemed very efficient, calling us old guys hon and sugar as she took our orders.  That always makes for a better tip you know, we like to be called hon and sugar by attractive young waitresses.  The illusion was shattered when she started bringing out the food and made an announcement that the kitchen had screwed up her tickets and we would have to tell what we ordered as she brought it out.......who had a special?  Half the room raised their hands and laughed.......shades of Victoria and last weeks screw up.  We all ate though so it was a good lunch.

I didn't hear a bike count but there had to be close to 35 with the usual variety of machines.  One that caught everyone's eye was the spanking new Can-Am Spyder three wheeler from Wichita.

I thought we were going to the Guzzi dealer in Wichita so Marty could pick up so parts but as it turned out we left him there talking to a salesman about an '03 Guzzi that he had just taken for a test ride.  I'm betting he buys it for his trip to Wisconsin next week.  Everyone needs two Moto Guzzis.

Douglass, KS 6-11-08

ROMEO Lunch

REB Throttle Cable Inspection and Lubrication

In preparation for my ride to the REunion in Minnesota next week I am doing some routine maintenance on the REB and decided to take a few photos.  The last time I tried this I dropped my camera and smashed it to bits so have to be more careful with this job.  I just wanted to lube the cable and make sure it wasn't about ready to snap.  First step is to remove the tank.  Two bolts, pull the fuel line from the fuel tap and lift off the tank.  If the tank is about empty it's a lot lighter.  No photos of this.  This is a good time to look over all the wiring that runs under the tank and anything else that looks suspicious.

I already knew this rubber cap needed to be replaced and I had two spares on the shelf.  These things are notorious for rotting and splitting.  They sit right up against the bottom of the tank so they don't last long.  Now screw the throttle adjuster all the way in to get some slack in the cable.

 

 

 

With the cable slack unscrew the mixing chamber cap.  You should be able to do this without a tool.  Lift the cap off the carb body, the slide and spring will come out of the body.  Removing that little plate under the spring is the next task.

 

 

 

 

If you hold the whole thing just so with your thumb pushing the spring up and holding the throttle cable you can grab the little tab on the plate with a pair of needle nose pliers and lift it out.

 

 

 

Once that plate is out you just turn the slide away from the cable and it comes right off.  No I didn't take a picture, I only have two hands.  You will see a couple of screws under the plate, keep your tool off of them unless you want to adjust the height of the needle hanging out the bottom of the slide.  Take all the hardware and the old rubber cap off the cable and turn you attention to the twist grip up there on the handle bar.

Take the two screws holding the housing onto the handle bar out and carefully separate it to expose the throttle cable in the twist grip rotor assembly (hey that's what Royal Enfield calls it in the parts book).  Be careful cause there is electrical stuff in there.  Make sure you don't lose the ferrule at the end of the cable.  In fact it's a good idea to take it off and replace it with a dab of silicone stickem of some kind.  Enough to hold it in place and not interfere with the cable operation.  If the cable snaps and you loose the ferrule, you're screwed.

 

Examine this part carefully, most new Enfields break the throttle cable just below that barrel shaped thing cause it binds in the plastic housing on the twist grip.  If yours is binding work it over with a razor knife or dremel until it works smoothly.  The barrel needs to rotate in the housing.  I put some light grease in there to help things along.

 

 

 

 

Remember that rubber cap down there on top of the carb?  Well it's a good idea to take a good look at it before putting it on.  Here is my brand new, just out of the plastic bag, rubber cap.  Of course I didn't notice it until I was ready to drop the slide back into the carb body and I had to take the damn thing apart again.  Good thing I had another one that was better.

That's about it, drop the slide back into the carb body, screw the mixing chamber cap all the way down, hand tight only.  Adjust the cable to about an 1/8 inch of slack at the twist grip.  Make sure nothing is binding and put the tank back on.

You will want to take a test ride to make sure the throttle cable is binding up anyplace.  What's that, you smell gas?  You fergot to re-attach the fuel line dumb ass!  Scooter won't start, got no fire, check the big red kill switch on top of the throttle housing.

Just noticed that the wording in the photos is too small....squint, I'm tired.

REB throttle cable inspection and lube

Victoria, KS 6-4-08

Our lunch destination today was The Library Bar and Grill in Victoria, KS.  Home to the impressive St. Fidelis Church, the Cathedral of the Plains, built early by German setters. 

The Library was far from German though, with a menu of hamburgers and various fried and deep fried items.  As it turned out the hamburgers were first rate but getting them got to be a real hoot.  We speculated that they were cooking on a George Foreman grill because the food was slow in coming.  Our waitress, a grandmotherly lady of apparent Germanic heritage, was getting increasingly frustrated and aggravated.  It didn't help that ROMEOs were claiming food that they hadn't ordered because they couldn't remember what they ordered.  Dale tried to help her out by reminding her at every oppurtunity that he still hadn't received his onion rings.

As it turned out she did have a good sense of humor and we all had a good laugh when she dumped a basket of french fires in Louie's plate.  No one went hungry, although several in this crowd could miss a hamburger or two without much concern. 

Seven of us rode from Salina together but split in smaller groups for the return ride.  Some went to tour the church first.  Pat and I set out the find the wind farm north of Ellsworth.  Quite an impressive sight and more being built.

                                                                                                     Pat at the Wind Farm

 

Visit to Georgia

I'm slow with my blogging these days.  Over Memorial Day weekend the family got together at my youngest daughter's in Georgia.  I drove down a few day early hauling the Dubya and Sue flew down for the weekend.  Middle daughter and family drove from Virgina for the weekend.  Sadly the elder daughter couldn't make it from Kansas City.

Our grandson, Alexander rode the Dubya about a 1000 miles all in the garage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We all had a good time and after everyone left, #3, her hubby and I got a couple of days riding in.

                                           That's me on Eric's Z1000

Victoria, KS 6-4-08

Lunch at "The Library" and visit to the wind farm.

May '08 Visit to Georgia

Thunder on the Smokey 2008

4th annual motorcycle rally in Marquette, KS

Olpe, KS 5-14-08

The day started out a little different with the Salina and Lindsborg ROMEOs meeting in nearby Gypsum for the ride to Olpe.  With Richard in the lead six of us began a leisurely jaunt toward our first planned rest stop in Council Grove.  I was just enjoying the ride and lack of cross wind when I noticed blinkers ahead indicating a turn to the south.  The little green sign said Wilsey, one mile.  What the heck! must be a little cafe there that Richard wants to check out. No such luck, it's been many a year since Wilsey has seen a cafe or much of anything else for that matter.  The little town made someone's list of Kansas ghost towns and that's what the downtown was, just boarded up buildings.  What had once probably been a thriving community was now a ghost town.  No one took any pictures, we just stopped in the middle of the old main street and gawked like tourists.

When we pulled onto a side street in Council Grove before we got to the convenience store it became apparent that Richard was in his tour guide mode today.  This stop was to check out The Hermit's Cave.  You can Google that one if you're into Council Grove History.

Marty and Richard in the Hermit's Cave.

 

Another 40 miles put us in downtown Ople at the Chicken House, one of the more famous chicken restaurants in Kansas.  Most of the crew had already arrived and the parking lot was full of bikes.  The preliminary count was 53 but I'm thinking with some of the late arrivals there had to be at least 60.  

The ROMEOs are accustomed to ordering off the menu and as you can imagine the tastes of a geezer crowd this size are pretty varied.  If you didn't like chicken you were out of luck today, it's a chicken house and by damn chicken is what you got.  The salads were already on the tables and it wasn't long before a plate of fried chicken was down and ready to eat.  Pretty tasty bird.

After the parking lot social hour the crowd started dwindling and we mounted up for the trek back home.  We were joined by Denny on his big black Gold Wing.  I like riding close to Denny, we have the same taste in music.  The parade only got the ten miles to Emporia before we wheeled into a parking lot to check out a custom sidecar rig we had spied on the ride down.  It was a beauty as you can see from the photo.

Dairy Queen in Council Grove is a biker friendly place with picnic tables and, once the leaves get grown, shade trees.  We met the owner on a previous stop, he was out back washing his Gold Wing.  Told us he was the town mayor.  We didn't see him today but wondered how his political career was going.

The trouble with these ride reports is how to end them without getting poetic, lyrical, eloquent, or philosophical, and exposing my limited journalistic talents.  Let's just say we made it home and it was a good motorcycle day.

BOW

Our Fearless Leader forgot his camera today so he delegated me to pick the BOW.  This shiny Honda CBX reached right out and smacked me with one of it's six header pipes as I walked by. 

ROMEOism

After the day's ride and while attending a church supper a friend commented that her BMW riding brother from Ottawa had gone to lunch in Olpe today.  Small world, sorry I missed you John.